My breathing eases, my heart stops trying to hammer its way out of my chest as I clutch her to me, my face buried in her hair.
“Stay.” It takes me a moment to realize I’m the one who has spoken.
“My mom is waiting downstairs, in the car.” She pulls away, and I reluctantly let her. Her blue eyes seem colorless in the low light spilling through my door onto the landing. “But I don’t want to leave you alone.”
Then don’t. Please don’t.
She’s looking at me with concern, but not with pity, and it eases a hard knot of tension inside my chest. I couldn’t take it if she felt pity for me.
“Okay, how about this?” Her hands are on my arms and the need to pull her back to me is crushing me. “I’ll go drive Mom home, and come back here. In case you want to talk. Yes?”
“Yes,” I breathe. Yes, yes, yes.
She smiles and steps back. “See you later.”
“I’ll give you a key,” I say as she turns around and vanishes in the shadows.
To my place, to myself, and to all the horrors that live here, if you’ll keep coming back.
Chapter Eight
Cassie
Skipping down the stairs, because the elevator still has that out-of-order sign hanging on its door, I make my way out of Shane’s building and into the brightly-lit avenue. My car is parked on the curbside, my mom a faint ghost sitting inside.
I hated leaving Shane. He was so pale when the door opened I thought he was about to keel over, sweat running down his face, his eyes so dark and wide with fear. Can’t wait to drive Mom home and return, make sure he’s okay.
He’s been on my mind since that flashback he had. Well, more than usual. I hate being away from him in general. This is what I’ve come to realize these past weeks. I miss him when I’m not near. I worry about him.
And my night time fantasies have started revolving around a certain long-haired, dark-eyed boy.
Crazy, I know. I mean, I haven’t even seen him with his T-shirt off. I don’t think I’ve ever talked so much with a boy without getting him naked.
Haven’t ever talked so much to a boy, period. Not that Shane talks back much—but the few things he says stay with me.
Like asking me to stay tonight.
He hasn’t tried to kiss me again, I think as I walk around the car, shivering in my coat, snowflakes drifting around me. Does that mean he decided he doesn’t want me that way? Do I trigger something ugly inside his head?
I can’t get the thought out of my head—but neither can I forget the feel of his lips on mine¸ his denim-clad hard-on under my hand, his taste. The power in his hands, in his tall frame.
The terrifying flashback, the way he kept throwing himself on the side of the bed, trying to escape whatever horror held him in its clutches.
“Hey, baby girl.” Mom is wasted, her blond head lolling against the car window, hair disheveled and tangled. Her lipstick is smeared on her chin. “What took you so long? Thought you weren’t coming back.”
“You’re drunk, Mom.” I huff, half in fondness, half in exasperation as I drive off the curb and into the traffic. “Why didn’t Jerome take you home tonight?”
“Jerome is a dumbass.” She frowns, and wrinkles deepen on either side of her mouth. I hadn’t noticed them before. “He didn’t show up and won’t answer his phone. So I met this nice young man, Eddie, who bought me drinks and asked me to go to his place, but then he disappeared, so…”
So I’m driving my very drun
k, listless and despondent mom back instead. Something tells me I should be angry with her for doing this time after time to herself—giving herself out cheap, letting any man fondle her, fuck her and leave her just to pass the night.
But I can’t, because oh God, it sounds so familiar. So much like something I’d have done not so long ago. Something I almost did last week.
Jesus.
And I’ve changed for a boy who can’t kiss me without freaking out and who’s obviously dragging a much heavier burden behind him than I ever imagined when I found out both he and his half-brother spent time in prison.